Bane of Malekith

This is a dark age, a bloody age, an age of daemons and of sorcery. It is an age of battle and death, and of the world’s ending. Amidst all of the fire, flame and fury it is a time, too, of mighty heroes, of bold deeds and great courage.

These are bleak times. Across the length and breadth of the Old World, from the heartlands of the human Empire and the knightly palaces of Bretonnia to ice-bound Kislev in the far north, come rumblings of war. In the towering Worlds Edge Mountains, the orc tribes are gathering for another assault. Bandits and renegades harry the wild southern lands of the Border Princes. There are rumours of rat-things, the skaven, emerging from the sewers and swamps across the land. And from the northern wildernesses there is the ever-present threat of Chaos, of daemons and beastmen corrupted by the foul powers of the Dark Gods.

An ancient and proud race, the high elves hail from Ulthuan, a mystical island of rolling plains, rugged mountains and glittering cities. Ruled over by the noble Phoenix King, Finubar, and the Everqueen, Alarielle, Ulthuan is a land steeped in magic, renowned for its mages and fraught with blighted history. Great seafarers, artisans and warriors, the high elves protect their ancestral homeland from enemies near and far. None more so than from their wicked kin, the dark elves, against whom they are locked in a bitter war that has lasted for centuries.

Prologue

The wizard looked over the gameboard at Death. ‘You are not real,’ he said.

‘Come now, Caledor,’ said Death. ‘You are in no position to cast aspersions. After all, you are dead.’

The wizard touched the place where his heart should have been. There was no beat. He placed his hand over his mouth. He did not breathe. He touched his wrist. There was no pulse.

A small fragment of knowledge came back to him. He had died a long, long time ago, trying to save the world. He had died slowly, in great pain, while trying to work powerful magic.

Caledor – his name had been Caledor once, when he had walked among the living and still had use for such a thing. He had not known that until Death had mentioned it. He could remember almost nothing else about himself, but it was good to have a name once more. It was a beginning, something he could build on.

‘Nonetheless,’ Caledor said, ‘you are not real.’

Death raised a long pale hand and removed his ivory mask. He knuckled the hollow space below his eye and he let out a long patient sigh that seemed to go on forever, as was the nature of even the least of the actions of gods. ‘I suppose you are going to argue about the nature of a reality that allows you to be dead and yet be aware of my existence and of your own. You are one of those for whom there is no afterlife, only a negation, a non-being.’

‘Not at all,’ said Caledor. ‘I merely doubt the reality of this whole experience.’

‘Living things have been doing that since the world began,’ said Death. ‘I am surprised that you, of all the elves, should be so unoriginal.’

‘Why am I here?’ Caledor asked.

‘You are here to play the Great Game and decide the fate of the world.’

Caledor considered Death’s words as he considered Death himself. The dark god had taken the form of a tall elf, very pale of skin.